


Concentration

by DawnlitWaters



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Established Relationship, John is on to you and your thinking Sherlock Holmes, John is pretty masterful, Johnlock - Freeform, Living room floor-based debauchery, M/M, POV Sherlock Holmes, Romance, Sherlock needs to buy a new shirt, Sherlock needs to think less, Slash, Stories are meant to have a plot now?, plot what plot?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-27
Updated: 2013-02-27
Packaged: 2017-12-03 20:25:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/702298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawnlitWaters/pseuds/DawnlitWaters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Sherlock are having trouble concentrating.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Concentration

_I’ll get it this time_ , Sherlock thinks, as John pulls him down into his lap, _I’ll catch it and isolate it. It’s only chemical reactions, after all._

_I just need to concentrate._

_Besides_ , Sherlock thinks, as John deftly manoeuvres both of them off the armchair and onto the floor, taking care not to knock Sherlock’s head on the grate, _I’ve done this a couple of times now, so I’m used to it, although not like this what is he –_

John runs his fingers possessively down Sherlock’s chest, and then abruptly, without warning or preamble, rips open his shirt. One of the buttons _pings!_ off the knife in the mantelpiece.

‘That happens to be’ –  John smothers his mouth with an all-consuming kiss – ‘my second favourite’ – John leans in again – ‘shirt.’

‘Really?’  John drags hot, wet nips and sucks down Sherlock’s throat. When he speaks it sounds breathless and growly and Sherlock can feel it vibrating through his skin. ‘Because it happens to be’ – another mark sucked onto Sherlock’s flesh, like pain but not quite – ‘my _absolute_ favourite.’

‘I don’t think I can wear it again now, you realise.’ Sherlock’s voice is breathless in his own ears.

‘Probably a good thing’ – John pauses just long enough to undo Sherlock’s belt buckle – ‘for my concentration levels’ –  he tugs Sherlock’s trousers and underwear down in one – ‘at crime scenes.’

John crawls back over him, admires his handiwork.

‘Christ, I’ve wanted you all bloody day.’

Sherlock swallows.

John mouths slower, caressing kisses down the other side of Sherlock’s throat, sucking at his collarbone and nuzzling against his shoulder. The hand not supporting his weight fumbles the cuff of Sherlock’s shirt open and pushes the material up. He raises Sherlock’s arm between them and touches his lips to Sherlock’s skin in a line of gentle presses from inner elbow to wrist. When he reaches the pulse point he turns Sherlock’s hand over, palm side down, looks up to meet Sherlock’s gaze and then draws Sherlock’s middle and index fingers slowly into his mouth.

With the few remaining synapses he has under his control, Sherlock thinks _Christ, this is what having a heart attack feels like_. And then the plucky few give up entirely, and all he can think about is _John’s mouth and John’s eyes_ because there are too many endorphins getting in the way and not enough blood _and really, can there be anything else worth thinking about?_ – John releases Sherlock’s fingers, leans over him as he presses Sherlock’s hand back over his head, and then smoothes his fingertips over Sherlock’s stomach, below his navel, below his hips, lower and lower until everything goes white in Sherlock’s head – and _Oh my God_ , _my heart, it’s stopped entirely now. John, John, help, you need to –_

Then John kisses him, slower and deeper this time and Sherlock feels his heart start to pound again as he keens helplessly into John’s mouth. John strokes his fingers up and down, beginning a steady rhythm _too slow, too slow_ and Sherlock’s spine flexes off the floor to press closer, _more, not enough, need more, John, more._

‘Not yet, not yet, calm down. Sshhh, just breathe, Sherlock, that’s it.’

John removes his hand. Sherlock makes an involuntary noise of annoyance against John’s cheek.

‘Don’t be so bloody impatient’ Sherlock can feel John’s voice and breath, close and hot on his face. He can hear John smiling as he plants a kiss on Sherlock’s eyebrow.

John reaches for Sherlock’s other hand, the one he isn’t holding captive against the carpet. He guides Sherlock’s unresisting fingers down to his jeans and breathes ‘Help me’ against Sherlock’s ear.

_Yes,_ Sherlock thinks, all the neurons lining up at the chance to be useful and co-ordinated in this supreme moment of crisis, _yes, yes of course._

John has mercifully undone the buckle himself, and so Sherlock manages, blind and one-handed, to slip the leather free, undo the button and draw down the zip. His fingers are fumbling and clumsy, as John seems to be doing everything possible to distract him from this important task, such as restlessly rocking his hips back and forth, raking his fingers through his hair and whispering the filthiest, most wonderful promises into his ear.

He stops when Sherlock _finally, finally_ slides his fingers inside the soft cotton of his underwear, his words being replaced with a low groan in the back of his throat.

The two of them stay very still, panting breaths almost in unison. Detachedly, Sherlock realises that his own underwear, and trousers, are still caught round his ankles. And he’s still wearing his socks. The thought strikes him as deeply amusing and he grins, the proper smile that John likes, and allows himself a breathy laugh.

‘What?’ says John, smiling slightly, despite himself.

‘I’m still wearing my socks’ Sherlock informs him.

John snorts and looks around and down at the floor over his shoulder. Sherlock wriggles his toes.

‘So you are’ John turns back to face him, and arches an eyebrow ‘Not a lot else, though.’

‘Not compared to you, certainly.’

‘True, perhaps I should do something about that.’

‘I really wish you would.’

‘Well, if you insist.’

‘I do.’

‘Alright then.’ John leans down to bring their mouths together again, pushing his jeans and underwear from his hips. He shrugs out of his shirt and then sits back, reaching both arms over his head to pull off the t-shirt beneath.  The muscles in his arms flex, his stomach tenses slightly and as the material is swept off in one fluid motion, Sherlock finds he has front row seats to one of the more spectacular displays in London. John has lovely skin, bronzed and warm, and he’s more muscular than the woolly jumpers let on.  Sherlock reaches out to trace a line from shoulder to –

‘Nope, enough of that.’

‘But –’

John throws the t-shirt aside and it collides with something that makes an ominous _scraping_ noise before hitting the floor with a glassy _smash._ Sherlock has a sudden fear for his experiments table.

‘What was –’

‘Doesn’t matter’ John thwarts his attempt to sit up and shoves him back to the floor. He drops his voice by an impressive extent and growls in Sherlock’s ear ‘now, where were we?’

John doesn’t give him time even to draw breath, simply covers his mouth with a kiss, a slow slide of tongues and lips that coaxes another involuntary moan out of Sherlock’s throat.  _A rhetorical question  then,_ thankfully, because Sherlock doesn’t trust himself to speak. John’s free hand is stroking down his side over his hip – John rocks his hips forward, cradles them together – and Sherlock just about manages to bite off the shout at the bolt of pleasure that spikes through him. He curls the fingers of his free hand as tight as he can around John’s hip. John nips at his ear lobe.

‘Careful.’

‘Shut up,’ Sherlock manages to say, without sounding too breathless or high-pitched.

John smiles, nuzzles against the corner of Sherlock’s jaw, and then casually reaches down between their bodies and wraps his fingers around both of them. Sherlock buries his face in John’s shoulder, his breathing almost painfully hard and erratic and his fingers no doubt leaving bruises on John’s back. He can hear John’s frantic breaths against his cheek, feel John’s fingers twining tighter with his own above their heads and it’s impossible, absolutely impossible to think or feel anything beyond the heat of John’s skin and the weight of his body and the paralysing, desperately pleasurable strokes of his fingers and _Oh God was there anything else in the world worth thinking about at all?_

_God that might be it, right there._

‘Oh God, John, please, I can’t –’

_I need to concentrate, it’s just chemistry, it’s just…_

Sherlock comes on a choked back cry, his spine curling off the floor and his fingers pressing deeper bruises into John’s skin. John lets go of his fingers, places his hand beside Sherlock’s curls and kisses him, breathing soothing words – ‘you’re lovely, you know, so fucking lovely, _Christ_ , how you make me feel, you beautiful, _beautiful_ man’ – against his mouth.

He realises, dazedly, that he’s missed it again. _Wasn’t concentrating._

_Damnit._

 He strokes John’s back as he shudders against him, and breathes in the reassuring scent of sweat, sex and soap at John’s neck. John takes a few steadying breaths through Sherlock’s hair, before relaxing against him, taking the weight off his arms and knees. The extra weight is warm and comforting, and Sherlock wraps one arm round John’s waist and the other about his shoulders.

John murmurs something indistinct, and then Sherlock is being rolled sideways and John is insinuating his hand under what remains of his shirt, stroking his fingers up Sherlock’s spine and splaying his hand between his shoulder blades. Sherlock rests his head on John’s bicep, nose pressed against his sternum.

‘I do love this shirt. It’s a good colour on you.’

‘Pity it’s been ruined then.’

John leans back in mock assessment, plucking at the straggling button-threads and loosened cuff. Sherlock watches him carefully, drinking in the angles of his eyebrows and the quirk of his lovely, lovely mouth.

‘Yeah, you do look a bit debauched, I must admit.’

Sherlock smiles and closes his eyes.

‘I wonder whose fault that is.’

‘Maybe you should’ – John leans in and places a kiss to Sherlock’s cheek – ‘deduce it from’ – he stands, carefully extricating himself from the tangle of limbs – ‘the evidence in front of you.’

Sherlock examines the evidence in front of him: one army doctor, male, Caucasian with faint suntan, gloriously naked. Lazy heat flares in his stomach. _Perhaps this is it._

John smiles at him and then cocks his head to the side at Sherlock’s thoughtful expression.

‘You’re doing it again, aren’t you?’

‘What? No!’

‘Yeah, you are. It won’t work you know.’ John leans down to swipe up some of his clothes – Sherlock catches his breath at the sight of lean muscles moving below soft, smooth skin – and then he looks about for his t-shirt. Sherlock lets his breath go with a sigh. S _hould probably get up in a moment._

‘It’s not one thing, you know, you can’t _isolate_ it, or distil it like a bloody chemical…’

Sherlock pouts.

John looks at him, a mixture of affection and pity.

‘I’m going for a shower. Feel free to join me, you look a mess.’

Sherlock makes a non-committal humming noise and rolls onto his back as John pads out of the room. He stares at the ceiling, feeling the sweat cool on his skin. He closes his eyes and steeples his fingers under his chin.

_John’s arms round him, his nose pressed into John’s chest._

_‘… you can’t isolate it, or distil it like a bloody chemical..’_

_John’s mouth on his neck, John’s hands on his chest._

_‘…my absolute favourite…’_

_His fingers in John’s mouth._

_‘Help me.’_

_John’s hands on him, stroking, stroking._

_‘…you’re lovely, you know, so fucking lovely…’_

Sherlock opens his eyes with a gasp. He’s lying, mostly naked, and panting on the floor of his own sitting room.

John is standing in his peripheral vision, hands on his hips, biting his lip. Sherlock drops his hands.

‘Seriously, give it up. You can’t isolate what love feels like. Come and have a shower.’

John holds out a hand. Sherlock licks his lips, sits up and lets John help him to his feet. John takes his head between both hands and kisses him firmly on the mouth.

‘I love you, you mad bastard. Now come and have a shower. And for God’s sake, this time remember to take your socks off.’

Sherlock blushes.

**Author's Note:**

> I actually sat down to work on a multi-chapter AU idea I’m toying with, and then my head-cannon-John walked in and demanded that I write this instead.
> 
> So it’s all his fault, you see.
> 
> I’ll leave it up to your imaginations which shirt it was.


End file.
